Why I support Affirmative Action..

Jumping into a conversation I haven't been a part of, I support affirmative action in practice, not just theory, based on my experience in the classroom. If I were running admissions at Princeton, and I had a choice between a 1550 SAT from Phillips Exeter and a 1150 from the public high school my 8th graders will go to (where half drop out), I'd pick the 1150 because that student is smarter. If someone can manage to score an 1150 from that high school where they have to navigate violence, drugs, unruly classrooms and ineffectual teaching, chances are they taught themselves. Chances are they will do more with Princeton professors than the 1550 will. Of course they will probably not be as well read, and I'll have to start teaching them at a lower level, but I think at the end of 4 years, the 1150 student will end up further along than the 1550 student.

And if I had 100 seats and I had 100 Exeter students and 100 stand-out students from failing high schools, I wouldn't take a single Exeter student. And that has nothing to do with ethics or guilt or history or any of that. If I were the most conservative person out there, but knew what I know now about the dismal state of our worst public schools, I'd take every single kid who grew up with nothing (not even a school that knew how to protect them let alone teach them) over every single kid who was nurtured all through school.

I respect your honesty. It's good to see. (Although I wouldn't go so far as to take EVERY person from the one high school.)

It also raises an interesting point indirectly, about intelligence. Many (I'm not saying all) people with those 1550 SATs feel that they "earned" their great scores and good grades. Many people cannot see how much a factor their environment plays.

The critics are going to argue that it should remain a meritocratic system. Yet if we pick just the 1550 SAT student, are we really basing it solely on the merits of the student? No, and as such, we should consider the environment in its proper context.

(And, just for the record, I am not one of those people who went to a poor school. I had a great secondary education at a private school.)

(And, while I'm on this topic, it's not solely a black-white issue. Studies have shown that white kids do poorly at these schools too. They need help too, and they're not getting it either.)

people hate poverty, not specific racial or ethnic groups. who would object to hanging out with brad pitt, denzel washington, benito del toro and lucy liu? not many. hutu-tutsi conflict? same race, same ethnic group, same region. people always find reasons to hate one another. racism wasn't invented by whitey.

hey i'd like to borrow those rose-coloured glasses when you're done with them.

i agree with your last sentence, though i object to your use of the term "whitey." i find it racist and offensive and i demand an immediate apology.

I'm not even white, but I thought the same thing. It caught me off guard when I was reading bits of this thread. Mind as well call me a spickey or black people, blakeys and asian people, chinkeys...not cool or acceptable at all.

Jumping into a conversation I haven't been a part of, I support affirmative action in practice, not just theory, based on my experience in the classroom. If I were running admissions at Princeton, and I had a choice between a 1550 SAT from Phillips Exeter and a 1150 from the public high school my 8th graders will go to (where half drop out), I'd pick the 1150 because that student is smarter. If someone can manage to score an 1150 from that high school where they have to navigate violence, drugs, unruly classrooms and ineffectual teaching, chances are they taught themselves. Chances are they will do more with Princeton professors than the 1550 will. Of course they will probably not be as well read, and I'll have to start teaching them at a lower level, but I think at the end of 4 years, the 1150 student will end up further along than the 1550 student.

And if I had 100 seats and I had 100 Exeter students and 100 stand-out students from failing high schools, I wouldn't take a single Exeter student. And that has nothing to do with ethics or guilt or history or any of that. If I were the most conservative person out there, but knew what I know now about the dismal state of our worst public schools, I'd take every single kid who grew up with nothing (not even a school that knew how to protect them let alone teach them) over every single kid who was nurtured all through school.

I respect your honesty. It's good to see. (Although I wouldn't go so far as to take EVERY person from the one high school.)

It also raises an interesting point indirectly, about intelligence. Many (I'm not saying all) people with those 1550 SATs feel that they "earned" their great scores and good grades. Many people cannot see how much a factor their environment plays.

The critics are going to argue that it should remain a meritocratic system. Yet if we pick just the 1550 SAT student, are we really basing it solely on the merits of the student? No, and as such, we should consider the environment in its proper context.

(And, just for the record, I am not one of those people who went to a poor school. I had a great secondary education at a private school.)

(And, while I'm on this topic, it's not solely a black-white issue. Studies have shown that white kids do poorly at these schools too. They need help too, and they're not getting it either.)

At what point though--I ask the critics--do we let being a student be about learning instead of about producing results? If getting into college is about "merits," then high school is s performance instead of a chance to learn and risk and grow. If you have to have taken AP classes in order to merit entrance into the top colleges, then middle school is also about performance and not growth. If you have to be in Pre-AP classes in order to merit a seat in AP classes, then elementary school is about performance and not growth. And this isn't just some guy talking on a message board. This is exactly what is happening in public schools right now with our era of super-high-stakes testing.

Admission for schooling shouldn't be about merit, it should be about potential. That't one of the reasons people get offended when a "URM" gets selected with lower numbers than them. They think they "earned" a seat and are therefore entitled to it.

I will be attending an Ivy League law school, one of the best in the nation, and I'm damn lucky to be. That isn't to say my numbers are below average, they're not. And it's not to say I haven't worked hard and done interesting things, I have. But I'm damn lucky because Penn decided that there's a brain in my head worth molding. Here I am, some kid who grew up in poverty, going to Penn. That's pretty amazing, at least to me. I didn't merit this seat; I just still have some untapped potential.

And once I graduate, it still won't be about merit, it will be about skills and potential. An organization that hires me will be betting on my potential to do their organization good, and that I have the skills to do so as well.

Well said. You have a good head on your shoulders. I can see why Penn chose you.

I am proud of what I have done, but I also realize that if I am able to get into a T14, I will be extremely lucky. (Heck, I'm lucky to get into Tier 2 schools.)

i think the most xenophobic, racist people on the planet are the Japanese. they beat whitey every which way, heck they also hate whitey.

No point proven other than "Not just white people are racist." So?

the point my friend is that white people are quite often the least racist of any racial/ethnic background. you don't have to look around too far to find worlds without white influence where racism rears her ugly head not only throughout history (one reason I mention Japan; you could also look at China, the Indian sub-continent, the Persian empire, north and south american Native American tribes) but today (look at Zimbabwe and the persecution of white farmers). people in power, regardless of racial/ethnic background love to take it out on those who do not look like them, especially those who least resemble them. white, industrialized societies have often been at the forefront of opening up their economies/countries to people of various ethnic/cultural/racial and religious backgrounds. they condemned slavery and trumpeted liberte, egalite, fraternite long before many other societies. in many areas of the world these conditions of outright slavery still exist (China, the African Continent). have we obtained an ideal society? hardly. would it be better if Latinos or African Americans (whatever these imprecise tags mean...much like whitey) were in the racial/ethnic majority? not likely.

i think the most xenophobic, racist people on the planet are the Japanese. they beat whitey every which way, heck they also hate whitey.

No point proven other than "Not just white people are racist." So?

the point my friend is that white people are quite often the least racist of any racial/ethnic background. you don't have to look around too far to find worlds without white influence where racism rears her ugly head not only throughout history (one reason I mention Japan; you could also look at China, the Indian sub-continent, the Persian empire, north and south american Native American tribes) but today (look at Zimbabwe and the persecution of white farmers). people in power, regardless of racial/ethnic background love to take it out on those who do not look like them, especially those who least resemble them. white, industrialized societies have often been at the forefront of opening up their economies/countries to people of various ethnic/cultural/racial and religious backgrounds. they condemned slavery and trumpeted liberte, egalite, fraternite long before many other societies. in many areas of the world these conditions of outright slavery still exist (China, the African Continent). have we obtained an ideal society? hardly. would it be better if Latinos or African Americans (whatever these imprecise tags mean...much like whitey) were in the racial/ethnic majority? not likely.

I don't know how to wade out of all these non-sequiturs. In fact, I've said these things so many times on this board, I won't even bother. I will say this:

1) You've still proven nothing but "Other (non-white) people are racist too." We all know this. Unfortunately, it's irrelevant to this thread, or to the point that was being discussed.2) The pervasive and systemic racism we know today was mostly the result of a shift in European attitudes in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. That doesn't mean that racism didn't exist all over the world before that, but it was simply just not to the same degree or with such devastating effect. Nor does that mean that it was ever limited to just whites. But those other "types" of racism (and please don't confuse xenophobia with racism) are -- again -- irrelevant to this thread, because they are irrelevant to affirmative action.